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No I didn't consider myself lucky - and to this day - wish I'd never seen it. Wish they'd never stood outside my tent. Wish they'd never slapped it multiple times trying to get a reaction. Wish they've never thrown pebbles at the tent to get a reaction. And it only got worse when soon enough - as we shined our lights down where we'd shot that deer that almost had it's neck broken by something - there were seven pairs of glowing eyes looking back up at us - and slowly blinked out as they moved just a bit to get behind trees. Which told me there were certainly more than two - the one initially growling at me, and the one I saw as he ran at me. That realization of at least seven - didn't do a single thing to help me sleep at night. Wasn't one or two 'passing through,' but at least seven sharing the mountain with us. One's bad enough to be shocked by. Multiplied by seven - nope - no luck for me.

You got that right. Having cornered a BF I know that doing that makes them cranky. I was golfing last week in Seaside, and my trained eye noticed signs of some animal trail leading off the Tee back back into the underbrush next to the course. Curious because the game trail was well used, I expected some deer to be bedding down back there. It was not a deer but a couple of nasty tempered coyotes that growled at my intrusion. Like humans most critters do not like being messed with in their dens.

Just curious why you would know of a suspected cave location, suspect BF inhabitants, and never check it out? Certainly a group of boulders that gave two of you bad feelings would be on my list of places to explore too. I certainly may not go there solo but If I was convinced of BF occupants I could gather some people to check it out. All it takes is one inhabited cave and this BF existence issue could be solved. Not sure it would be a good idea to enter an inhabited cave but certainly the entrance could observed from a distance and cameras placed. A recently inhabited cave would tell us much more about them than we already know even if the occupants have stepped out. Do they use cultural artifacts? Do they process or store food? Do they make beds? DNA would be all over the place.

I've known and publicly stated for years the "witching" hour for BF approaching campsites and home sites is two to three AM. There is a logical reason for that, and a very good tactic for BF campers to take advantage of that fact to heighten researchers' chance of seeing one. The first one I - and five others - ever heard a BF screaming, roaring and yelling continuously for about 30 seconds without a break performed that unbelievable feat at 2:15 AM. (He was about a 1/4 mile from us but could see the light from our campfire.) The first one that walked into my solo campsite and examined my pot and pans - within three feet pg my head - did that at 2 AM. I made a short recording of one who approached my solo campsite and vocalized at 1:45 AM. (I did not hear him because it was 23 degrees, I was out of gas for my heater and was covered from head to foot with everything I could find.) Had one shake the heck out of a camper in which two of us were sleeping about a year or so ago. My partner was snoring like a freight train; and snoring is the key. If they can't hear people snoring, they won't come close, That's pretty well confirmed by the hundreds of other hunters and campers I've interviewed in 12 states over the past fifty or so years. The one exception seems to be - from personal observations - during nights of heavy rains.

My loose use of terminology - thus, my bad. Reflection. Red was the color. I think we had LED flashlights - I did - not sure about the others. That night, I don't recall any moon. Yes, we heard a whisper of movement, and we were expecting a cat or maybe even a bear to come that night for the deer - so we were sort of listening for signs of it being either dragged or eaten. Neither one of those noises - no real wind that night - so everything was silent. Just heard a couple small, barely discernible snaps - probably small twigs being stepped on. It was a very steep pitch to directly below, a semi-level area where they were traversing across the slope - and yes, there was water about forty or fifty yards further along the direction they were traversing to get to the deer. This was an older location. Yes, it was directly below where we camped. Since we went to bed rather early - it must have been somewhere within an hour and a half of sundown. I believe there were caves in the area, and in fact - while I didn't check it out - I felt strongly that there was a cave or large overhang below us and maybe 60-75 yards to the east - and I just had a gut feeling that some lived down there, as one was spotted in that location when it came out and stood still on a huge rock outcrop looking south - Slightly higher than us (we were about 150 feet below the absolute peak) was a large cluster of huge boulders. Before this ever happened, I told a guy 'every time I look at that cluster of boulders, I get a bad feeling.' He said that was funny as he did the same thing - and no one ever approached it. I'd say that I never thought of whether or not seven individuals would be a large group or not. Just a lot more than I wanted to know about. I didn't even want to know about one! This area was so rich in deer herds - if one went to sleep on a few game trails - you'd probably get trampled to death by deer. Just going up on an ATV, a few times I found myself right in the middle of a herd, and could have slapped three or four right on their rumps! The dumb things would run with me right up the cut! This area provided lots of game, water, isolation, and minimal intrusion. Yes, the locals are aware not just of this "clan," but there are apparently clans every few miles. One guy sees them on the road or crossing the road on his way to work - several miles away from this site - on a regular basis. As to your question about the 'people who should know about them' - not sure who those people are? I mean, everyone thereabouts know these things are everywhere - and everyone pretty much minds their own business. No law around, no city, and it's difficult country. I saw one guy who had a "Bigfoot Crossing" by the road in front of his house - and at first I thought it was a joke. After the fact - maybe not. I mean, you could hide a few infantry divisions within thirty square miles - so these things have no trouble detecting folks approaching along the only road - and avoiding the same. So it's not like a group of seven, or even seventy would have a problem remaining undetected. On occasion, as one is going back down - they'll throw a good sized rock out in the road in front of you, or just push a tree over to block the road - and you'd have to get down and move the tree to continue back down. Just letting you know they're not real welcoming.